Witness after witness appeared on the stand to attest the extraordinary inability of the police authorities to cope with the flagrant evils in the city or in the force under their command. On one occasion it was proved that the agents of the Society for the Prevention of Crime had been hunted by a mob of bullies and crooks for half a mile through Bowery. It was a regular riot, in which the agents for the Society were struck and stoned through the whole of Captain Devery’s precinct; the police officers looking on as amused spectators. They were appealed to for assistance, and took no notice. At last, the hunted men jumped on a car, and escaped with their lives. But although this riot had taken place in the heart of the city, and created a scandal through the whole of New York, Superintendent Byrnes reported that he could not find any evidence that there had been a riot (p. 4,834.) The extraordinary inability of the police to see what was going on under their noses, although apparently phenomenal, was so habitual that it ceased to excite any surprise. Saloons ran open all Sunday under the eyes of the patrolmen. The Superintendent of the Society for the Prevention of Crime gave evidence on this subject as follows:-- I pointed out an open saloon to a patrolman, whose name I do not know, and inquired why he did not close it; he said that if I insisted upon it, he supposed he must do so; but it would do no good, and only get him in trouble with the department and cause his removal to some undesirable precinct.--Vol. v., p. 4,835. [Illustration: JOHN C. SHEEHAN. Ex-Police Commissioner. Boss of Tammany.] But it is only when the Police Commissioners, who stand at the head of the whole force, are under examination that we discover the extent of their utter inability to find out anything. There was, for instance, Mr. Sheehan, who at that time was Police Commissioner, and who now is the titular Boss of Tammany Hall. The question of pool-rooms was under consideration when he admitted that they existed, and that he knew they were corrupting the police. Then the Chairman put the following question:-- And, notwithstanding the fact that you knew or had heard that those pool-rooms were corrupting the police, you thought it was not necessary to take any action upon it? Mr. Sheehan replied:-- I did start an inquiry to find out if those pool-rooms were paying, what they were paying, and who they were paying it to. I did that within a few months after I became a Police Commissioner, but I couldn’t get any authoritative information of any kind on the subject; but I got it from all sides that they were paying, and it was believed that they were, but no person would substantiate or stand for it.--Vol. iv., p. 3,765. So he abandoned the subject as one which it was no use discussing any further.